Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 215th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere … Featuring the seven most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (27 March -2 April, 2011), together with a hand-picked quintet, normally courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.

Don’t forget: you can sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox — just click here — ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.

As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:

1. The Lib Dem rebrand – tipping the scales of nonsense stories by Charlotte Henry on Virtually Naked.
“The Liberal Democrats are having to consider how to brand themselves now that they are a party of government, but that is as far as it goes. The full rebrand is a complete non-starter.” – a second week in the Dozen for Charlotte’s excellent post.

2. Can I remain a member of the Liberal Democrats? by David Grace on Disgruntled Radical.
A brief, existential post.

3. YouGov: Public not happy with Ed by Daniel Furr on Too lib·er·al [adj.].
Daniel has an ‘Ed for figures.

4. Seven reasons the Coalition looks set to last on Mark Pack’s blog.

5. Hugh O’Donnell quits Lib Dems by Andrew Page on A Scottish Liberal.
“Why the outburst now, just a day before nominations close?”

6. The Swing Voters Curse: The reason the Lib Dem vote didn’t live up to the polls at the General Election? by Matthew Gibson on Solution Focused Politics.
“The lessons from this experiment are that in tight elections the more information a voter has about a candidate and party, the more likely they are to vote. But also the more they think other people will vote for a party, the more likely there will be people wanting to vote against them.”

7. The Lib Dems’ branding crisis by Olly Grender at the New Statesman.
“A political party’s brand is more than a logo, it is its heart and soul,” says Olly.

And now to the five blog-posts that come highly recommended, regardless of the number of Aggregator click-throughs they attracted. These are normally chosen using the LibDig bookmarking website for party members, the site where you can highlight blog-posts you want to share with your fellow Lib Dems. Remember, though, you’re still more than welcome to nominate for the Golden Dozen a Lib Dem blog article published in the past seven days – your own, or someone else’s – using the steam-powered method of e-mail … all you have to do is drop a line to [email protected].

8. How LibDemHome was created by Ryan Cullen on The Artesea.
“On 1st April, Lib Dem Voice announced to a stunned blogosphere that Lord Ashcroft had bought the site, and it was being rebranded LibDemHome.org. Ryan explains the scary-looking code-magic that made it all happen.” (Submitted by stephenftall via LibDig.)

9. Not Too Far. Not Too Fast. by Chris Davies MEP.
“Chris Davies MEP takes the long view on the debt and the deficit: how did we get here?” (Submitted by jen.yockney via LibDig.)

10. Cuts and opportunism by Joe Otten on The Extra bold Blog.
“Joe Otten nails Labour’s opportunism” (Submitted by niles via LibDig.)

11. Why I joined the Liberal Democrats on Nic Prigg’s blog.
“A Scottish Lib Dem explains why she joined the party… and why she’s staying.” (Submitted by stephenftall via LibDig.)

12. Liberal Democrats and Higher Education Funding by Matt McLaren on Wisdom and Power.
Matt proposed two motions at the Heythrop Students’ Union (HSU) Annual General Meeting – both carried. (Submitted by Matt McLaren via email.)

And that’s it for another week. Happy blogging ‘n’ reading ‘n’ nominating.

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